Big Ideas

[0:30] Deep down inside, my wife Amy has always wanted to run her own business, but the challenge is that she’s never been clear on what she wanted to do. She had all these random ideas but there was never one that really spoke to her or motivated her enough to get her business off the ground. She would always come to me and say things like, “I’m not an expert in anything” or “I don’t have any passions.” Well, I called BS on that! I said “Look, what’s the one thing that you would do without a shadow of a doubt no matter what?” And she said, “Travel.” And I said, “Exactly.” And she’s like, “Yeah, but what am I going to do? Like what kind of a travel business am I going to run?” I said, “I don’t know yet but don’t force yourself to immediately come up with the perfect answer. Just start exploring.”

[06:35] One of the great things about business is that there is so much opportunity everywhere and no matter what you have an interest in, start there. And then just start exploring, just investigate, start reading different magazines, go into different sites and when somebody mentions something on a site, go and explore that. Just explore. And through that, you’re going to start to find different problems and opportunities. And even if you don’t find problems and opportunities, you will start to gain clarity around something that you are passionate about and something that you can sell. And that slowly but surely started to happen with Amy.

[07:20] Whenever Amy travels she inevitably loves to go to the markets to buy authentic clothing and/or materials from the country that we’re visiting. And so, we started to think about how to combine those two things. We came up with the domain TravelThreads.com and the seed of the idea was born. She ultimately created these amazing shirts that say, “Brave is beautiful.” And what that meant was to be brave as a woman who’s traveling to all these different places and exploring all these different places sometimes by herself, sometimes with friends, sometimes with the family, but having that adventurous spirit within her. And so, she created these beautiful t-shirts, put them up on the site, and lo and behold, she got her first sale!

[10:00] I want to encourage you to take time to celebrate the wins. Because even for Amy she was just like, “Yay, I got it,” and then boom she was onto something else. I’m like, “Whoa, making your first sale it’s a huge deal. Take a moment and soak that up and really take joy and pride in the fact that this is all happening.” I’m telling you, as an entrepreneur, it’s really important to celebrate the wins because if you don’t, your brain doesn’t get the signal that what you’re doing is moving you toward the goals that you want to accomplish.

Resources

Memorable Quote

“That first sale, when somebody you don’t know buys your product, it just opens up this belief that anything is possible.” – Stu McLaren

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